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participated with him in the feeling and excitement." The facts are unquestionable, the explanation not difficult, but the precise rationale only to be comprehended when we comprehend, too, the nature of the nervous force.

"In the Journal of George Fox, a case of lameness suddenly relieved by an unexpected address under a state of religious ecstasy, is thus recorded: After some time I went to a meeting at Arn-side, where Richard Myer was. Now he had been long lame of one of his arms; and I was moved of the Lord to say unto him amongst all the people, Prophet Myer, stand up upon thy legs, (for he was sitting down,) and he stood up, and stretched out his arm, that had been lame a long time, and said, 'Be it known unto you, all people, that this day I am healed.' But his parents could hardly believe it; but after the meeting was done, had him aside, and took off his doublet: and then they saw it was true. He came soon after to Swarth-more meeting, and there declared how that the Lord had healed him. Yet after this the Lord commanded him to go to York with a message from him; and he disobeyed the Lord; and the Lord struck him again, so that he died about three quarters of a year after." 116.

Can we wonder that such cases should influence men, unused to reasoning, excited by enthusiasm, taught that faith is the one great merit, and struck, in their ignorance, by the similarity of the miracle to those which they have revered in Holy Writ. Can they nicely balance the weight of evidence, can they discriminate the spurious from the true, can they distinguish the products of fanaticism from those of inspiration, the first fruits of the Gospel from its remote and incidental grafts, can they, enthusiasts, sit in judgment on enthusiasm? When they can, we may expect sectarianism to cease.

The ROYAL GIFT OF HEALING, religious in its origin, political in its progress, and a farce in its conclusion, demands and receives the most loyal consideration from our author. The antagonism of England and France has appeared in this, as in all things else. Laurentius, physician to Henri Quatre, denied, as in duty bound, that the power resided in the Kings of Britain. The Rev. Dr. Tooker, chaplain to Elizabeth, proved most satisfactorily that it did not belong to the Kings of France. Probably in this, as in many disputes, both parties were right. But this regal prerogative degenerated sadly, for it fell, about the middle of the seventeenth century, into the plebeian hands of a Mr. Valentine Greatrakes; so, at least Mr. Pettigrew spells this gentleman's name, but we apprehend that, from the miracles he did, his unquestionable cures of King's evil, agues, epilepsy, palsy, and convulsions, Greatshakes was his real designation. And yet the thing itself was no great shakes, after all, for he made it a present, perhaps in part payment of his wages, to Mr. John Leverett, his gardener, who belonging, no doubt, to the Hare family, and being naturally delicate, protested that, "after touching thirty or forty a day, he felt so much goodness go out of him, he was as fatigued as if he had been digging eight roods of ground." A memorable fact, and one that goes a very good way towards confirming the reality of the operations of the Mesmerists, these latter apostles of the touch-and-go system, professing that they feel just the same thing.

We could not conscientiously close this article, intended, in our humble way, to magnify the marvellous, and to discourage that cold scepticism so

marring to the poetry of this rail-road age, without some allusion to the sympathetic cures which have immortalised the name of Sir Kenelm Digby, and are, perhaps, too lightly thought of now. For what can be attested better, what more circumstantial, what more historical, and what more satisfactory, than the following case.

"Mr. James Howel, a gentleman celebrated by his 'Dendrologia' and other works, in endeavouring to part two of his friends in a duel, received a severe wound of his hand. Alarmed at this accident, one of the combatants bound up the cut with his garter, took him home, and sent for assistance. The king, upon hearing of the event, sent one of his own surgeons to attend him; but as in the course of four or five days the wound was not recovering very favorably, he made application to Sir Kenelm Digby, of whose knowledge regarding some extraordinary remedies for the healing of wounds he had become apprized. Sir Kenelm first inquired whether he possessed anything that had the blood upon it, upon which Mr. Howel immediately named the garter with which his hand had been bound, which was accordingly sent for. A basin of water being brought, Sir Kenelm put into it a handful of powder of vitriol, and dissolved it therein. He then took the bloody garter, and immersed it in the fluid, while Mr. H. stood conversing with a gentleman in a corner of the room; but he suddenly started, and, upon being asked the reason, replied that he had lost all pain-that a pleasing kind of freshness, as it were a wet cold napkin had passed over his hand, and that the inflammation, which before had been so tormenting, bad vanished. He was then advised to lay aside all his plasters, to keep the wound clean, and in a moderate temperature. After dinner, the garter was taken out of the basin and placed to dry before a large fire; but no sooner was this done than Mr. H.'s servant came running to Sir Kenelm to say that her master's hand had again inflamed, and that it was as bad as before; whereupon the garter was again placed into the liquid, and before the return of the servant all was well and easy again. In the course of five or six days the wound was cicatrized, and a cure performed." 158.

If any are disposed to use that reason, so much abused, and to argue that the fact may be explained, consistently with our knowledge of the nature of wounds, the right mode of dressing them, and a liberal allowance for the credulousness of the actors, and for a circumstance generally admitted to be true, that a good story never loses in the telling, we bid them hold their peace and go their way, and not intrude their wretched philosophy upon us.

We have done. The superstitions connected with medicine have been many-the humbug still mixed up with it is great-it has jumped with our humour to laugh at the one, and possibly to indulge in a sneer at the other-they have both amused us in an idle hour-and we only hope that a few poor jokes, and a little raillery may be taken in good part by those who have leisure to glance at such a trifle.

TRAITÉ DE PATHOLOGIE CEREBRALE OU DES MALADIES DU
CERVEAU. NOUVELLES RECHERCHES SUR SA STRUCTURE,
SES FONCTIONS, SES ALTERATIONS, ET SUR LEUR TRAITEMENT
THERAPEUTIQUE, MORAL ET HYGIENIQUE. Par Scipio Pinel.
Paris, 1844. 8vo. pp. 560.

A Treatise upon Cerebral Pathology or the Diseases of the
Brain. By Scipio Pinel.

THIS work, principally devoted to the consideration of the changes which occur in the brain in the various forms of insanity, is intended by its author to be of an elementary and practical character, presenting to the student and practitioner an abridged but faithful summary of all that is known respecting the structure, functions, and diseases of the brain. It embraces several of his own researches, which he regards as new, upon acute inflammation of the brain, the indurated and oedematous condition of that organ, and upon general paralysis. He has divided the book into nine Chapters; the first treating of the General Pathology of the Nervous System, the second and third, of the Anatomy and Physiology of the Brain; the four next describe the various lesions, and the two last, enumerate their causes and detail their treatment. It is intended to give some notice of each of these Sections.

CHAP. I.-GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF THE PATHOLOGY OF THE
NERVOUS SYSTEM.

The author, after enumerating the various classifications of mental diseases adopted by Pinel, sen., Foderé, Georget, Esquirol, &c. observes that in all these the disorders of the understanding are taken as the basis, while the lesions of the various other functions of the nervous system are treated of as quite secondary, or are not even mentioned at all. In the brain, three principal functions are intimately combined, viz. the understanding, motility, and sensibility; and, although these possess very different characteristics, and are referrible to different localities, yet their relations in structure and function are so intimate, that they cannot be separated from each other, either in the study of the healthy or diseased conditions of the economy.

"If for a moment you can take courage to forget all that has been written upon this subject, and if as an impartial observer you enter amidst those vast assemblages of nervous affections which present themselves under every form and in every stage in the two great hospitals devoted to them at Paris, what do you first remark upon taking a general view of them. You there see some in a state of furious delirium, a greater number in calmer delirium, many more still in a state of simple dementia or paralytic dementia: you see entire sections of imbeciles, idiots, epileptics, and hysterico-epileptics; who constantly manifest extraordinary lesions of certain faculties, of certain desires, of the most grave disorders of the senses, of general sensibility, of motility and contractility. If you had the opportunity of observing these patients from the period of their admission to their death, and following them through their successive degradations, you would observe them for the most part pass insensibly from the state of furor

to that of mild delirium, then to the condition of dementia, paralysis, convulsions, epilepsy, imbecility, and so on, to the annihilation of every physical and moral power. Now is it not allowable for one who has had such a spectacle before his eyes for twenty years, to take a general view of this subject, and to believe that all these successive disorders, even while they constitute distinct affections, are in reality but more or less prolonged periods of the same disease. They are the expressions, in fact, of a series of alterations in the brain, which in the acute stage exalt at first all the sensory and motory powers of the organ, as in furor, hallucinations, acute delirium, and mania; which latter work a gradual change in its properties, and slowly give rise to the loss of memory, confusion and obliteration of ideas; and which, penetrating amid the motor and sensory fibres of the interior of the brain, then produce all the symptoms of paralysis, contractions, and insensibility; until, at last, affecting the most sensitive and most irritable fibres, such as those of the optic thalami, the peduncles, pons varolii, and medulla oblongata, produce the convulsive and epileptic attacks that presage the fatal termination of this slow succession of disorganizing processes which the cerebral mass has been undergoing. We are well aware that the affection of the brain does not always follow the regular progress; and that it may be first manifested either by epilepsy, or more rarely by paralysis, or by some other lesion of the understanding, motility, or sensibility. It little matters whether it rises from the base towards the periphery, or descends from the surface to the base. This progress does not influence the general results, and the rapid sketch we have drawn is sufficient to show the connexion and succession of all these cerebral affections, which with so little reason have been forcibly separated from each other."

Upon the foregoing principles Dr. Pinel founds his classification of affections of the brain, adopting indeed that which had been already in part developed by Andral. All changes in the brain, whether slight or extensive, give rise to certain derangements of functions, which are observed, either alone or united, under the following orders. 1. Lesions of the Understanding. 2. Lesions of the Propensities and Instincts. 3. Lesions of the External Senses and of Sensibility. 4. Lesions of Voluntary Motion.

The author protests strongly against the practice of regarding mental diseases as distinct in their nature from other affections of the brain. He regards it just as rational as it would be on the part of a pathologist, who, treating of the diseases of the respiratory organs, should confine himself to their most frequent symptom, the cough, should divide and subdivide this according to its various kinds, and having thus converted it into a special branch of medicine, should maintain that there existed no connection between the cough and the various bronchial and pulmonic changes. This is, however, done daily with regard to disorders of the intellect without its absurdity being perceived. Diseases of the brain, whether slight or severe, should be subjected to the same principles which regulate ordinary pathology, and the first step towards the accomplishment of this, is to remove the sense of vagueness with which nervous diseases are regarded. Every nervous symptom depends upon a temporary or permanent lesion, an organic change, whether slight or serious, in the structure of the nerves or in the nervous centres; and, if the morbid condition continues for some time, an alteration of structure appreciable by our senses, the microscope, or by chemical analysis, is always to be found. Those who fail to discover this often do so from their imperfect acquaintance with the normal structure. A long experience in making these examinations can alone effectu

ally show the almost constant correspondence between the functional lesions and the organic changes. Such changes are always found, but their form and appearances are often very variable, and quite peculiar to the nervous system, and of which the language in ordinary use forms a very imperfect means of description.

CHAP. II.-ANATOMY OF THE BRAIN.

This Chapter contains an account of the comparative anatomy of the brain, a full description of its healthy condition in man, and a general view of the morbid changes observed in it by various writers on insanity. An analysis of what is itself but a summary would be scarcely intelligible, and we will not attempt it.

Morbid Changes in the Brain in Insanity.-Of 216 cases reported by Greding, the bones of the cranium were found much thickened in 167, and very thin in 38. The most frequent and most manifest alterations were situated in the membranes of the brain. Soemmering attributes mania to inflammation of the brain. The observations of Haslam are fertile in examples of morbid changes after death of various kinds situated both in the membranes and the substance of the brain. Portal prefers doubting the sufficiency of his own senses to believing that a mental malady can exist without physical changes in the brain. Esquirol, writing in 1812, described various morbid changes, especially in the membranes of the brain, and accompanied by effusions; but, writing in 1835, he states that post-mortem examinations are insufficient in determining the material causes of insanity. A strange contradiction, considering the great progress these investigations had made in this interval. Gall and Spurzheim admit the frequency of sufficient causes of insanity being discoverable after death. M. Lallemand attributes very opposite lesions to one cause -meningitis. M. Foville states, as the result of his numerous researches, that the brains of the insane present, in general, the anatomical appearances seen in inflammation, and that such are seen more often in the brain than in its membranes. Changes in the cortical substance are the most constant of all, and are directly connected with the derangements of the understanding; while those occurring in the white portions influence the movements. MM. Bouchet and Cazanvieilly conclude that epilepsy is a chronic inflammation of the white substance, and that mental alienation arises from inflammation of the cortical portion. M. Calmeil attributes the paralysis of the insane to inflammation of the grey substance and of the membranes of the brain. The same changes have been observed by Davidson in more than 200 insane patients. Bertolini observed morbid changes, especially in furious mania and in dementia with paralysis. M. Ferrus declares that, according to his experience, the alterations produced by nervous diseases, are as distinct as those occurring in any other part of the body. M. Parchappe reports a great variety of morbid appearances occurring in 130 bodies examined by him during three years. The result of the whole, according to our author is, that there are superabundant facts for constituting a correct pathological anatomy of the brain as

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